current projects

Here's just a small list of some of the many projects Michael Chabon is currently working on. If you know of one that I do not, e-mail me.


THE MYSTERIES OF PITTSBURGH

Chabon announced on his website in September 2005 that Rawson Thurber, writer/director of Dodgeball (2004), is on-board to write and direct an adaptation of Chabon's first novel. Thurber's script, Chabon says, "is top notch."

Sienna Miller and Peter Sarsgaard star in the film. Sarsgaard (Jarhead) plays a character that combines two supporting characters in the novel, Arthur and Cleveland. Miller, who stared in Casanova, plays Jane, Cleveland's girlfriend.

The film has a budget of $6 million and filmed in Pittsburgh. Reports in April 2006 had suggested producers were considering filming in other cities, but that's no longer the case, according to one producer.

As for the changes from book to film, Chabon said he was fine with them.

"You're not just making a transcript of the novel with pictures, you're trying to reinvent the story so it works as a movie," Chabon told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in April 2006. "I think it's going to be great."

For more on the movie, visit the official Web site.


DETAILS MAGAZINE

Since October 2005, Chabon has had a regular column in Details magazine.


UNTITLED NON-FICTION BOOK

Chabon is tentatively set to publish his first non-fiction book in spring 2009. The so-far untitled book would discuss what it's like being a man in terms of being a son, a father and a husband, Publishers Weekly reports.

"Not just the Details columns, also other of my non-fiction writing on the subject, shaped, and hopefully given some kind of coherent structure," he said via e-mail. "Edited, in other words; first by me, then by my editor Jennifer Barth."

HarperCollins will publish it.


UNTITLED BAY AREA NOVEL

While promoting Yiddish Policemen's Union, Chabon said he wanted to write another adults-oriented novel. The book is said to be based in and around the contemporary Bay Area.

"I would like to get a new novel going," Chabon said during a chat hosted by The Washington Post. "I would like it to be set in the present day and feel right now the urge to do something more mainstream than my recent work has been."

Chabon said in June 2007 that it "is to be for adults, but I don't want to say anything more about it right now," including the title.

The novel is tentatively scheduled for 2011.


UNTITLED YOUNG ADULTS NOVEL

Details are scarce on this project, a young-adults novel. "This young-adult novel I'm working on now has some fantastic content," Chabon told Entertainment Weekly in May 2007. And that's almost all he's said so far on it. It's possible, though highly speculative, that Chabon is writing one of two previously discusses sequels to Summerland.

Chabon said in June 2007 that he'd put the novel on hold.

"Just wasn't working for me; I'll get back to it eventually," he said.


THE AMAZING ADVENTURES OF KAVALIER & CLAY (THE MOVIE)

Chabon was hired to adapt his own novel for the big screen. "It took eight drafts of the screenplay before the producer Scott Rudin finally said, 'OK, you did it.' But I have to say it really did get better with each draft and I could see that each time. Although I began each draft cursing and saying I was going to quit and I didn't care about this stupid movie and so on, usually, by the time I was done with that draft, I would say that he was right and it was better. And I think the last draft was pretty good."

The movie is currently stalled, though at last word Tobey Maguire and Natalie Portman were attached to star.

To get the whole scoop on the movie, head to the movie section.


SNOW AND THE SEVEN

Chabon was the first writer to sign on to Snow and the Seven for Disney. Directed by Hong Kong martial arts master Yuen Wo Ping (The Matrix, Iron Money), the movie will set the classic "Snow White" story in 1880s British colonial China and feature martial arts and fantasy elements. The film will be darker than the Disney Cartoon, borrowing from the Grimm Tales instead. The seven dwarves have been replaced by seven Shaolin monks.

By August 2006, Chabon had been replaced as the writer. A brief recounting by Chabon of the end of his job on the film went like this: "They love you, but they want to go in another direction." "What kind of dir--" "More of a fun direction." "Oh."

For more info, read the Hollywood Reporter article.


TALES OF MYSTERY AND IMAGINATION

Details are still fairly sketchy about what this book will contain. However, it is a book of short stories that promise to live up the the book's title.

According to an article at DealMemo.Com, the book will include "a horror story, a Sherlock Holmes adventure, a ghost story, an adventure story, a science fiction story, a story of suspense, a costume or period or historical story and a sea story" in styles similar to H.P. Lovecraft, Edgar Allen Poe, and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

Additionally, the book was optioned by Miramax before Chabon had even began to write it, so if Miramax likes any of the stories, they get first-dibs on a movie. By either coincidence or (more likely) clever naming, the book carries the same title as a collection of Edgar Allen Poe stories.


SUMMERLAND FOLLOW-UPS

Chabon is working on two Summerland sequels. Additionally, the original novel has been optioned by Miramax, though no word yet on how Chabon will be involved in the production.